


of most excellent fancy

by nosecoffee



Series: One of a Kind [6]
Category: Dear Evan Hansen - Pasek & Paul/Levenson
Genre: Angst, Comedy, Companion Piece to One of a Kind, Controversial opinions about Radiohead, Fluff, Humour, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Implied Referenced Suicide, M/M, Mentioned suicide, Orphan Black AU, and did we expect anything better, because its Jared, some insensitive comments on suicide, takes place immediately after chapter 50, wont make sense without context
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-13
Updated: 2018-04-13
Packaged: 2019-04-22 09:21:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,241
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14305623
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nosecoffee/pseuds/nosecoffee
Summary: "You're like a fucking clone or something.""I wouldn't go that far." Yorick says, with another grimace. "Don't you think that if human cloning was possible we'd know about it?""With this government?" Jared shakes his head. "Fuck no."(Or, in which Jared's relaxing vacation is interrupted by a familiar face)





	of most excellent fancy

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Act Five, Scene One, Page Eight of Hamlet, during Hamlet's monologue about Yorick.
> 
> It's been ages since I've written anything for DEH and it's refreshing that I would write for this AU.

"I'm scared for you." Evan whispers into his pillows.

" _I'm_ scared for _you_." Connor whispers back, holding Evan, his back to Connor's chest. Connor is far from surprised at himself, driving down from New York to hold his boyfriend.

"What a pair we make." Evan laughs, softly, and Connor winces at the lack of humour in it.

"You must wish you never met me." He says into Evan's neck, realising that though he never meant for it to go this far, it went anyways and there's nothing he can do to stop it.

"How could I?" Evan asks, and turns over, so close to Connor that he could kiss him, if he wanted to. He does want to. "You're probably the best thing that's ever happened to me. Bar nothing."

"Don't say that." Connor whispers, feeling heat flood his cheeks. "All this bullshit is going to get you killed."

"Only if I'm not careful." Evan does lean forward and kiss him, but only briefly, and Connor misses him even when Evan's lips are still on his.

"So please be careful." Connor says, sliding his left hand up Evan's neck to the juncture of his jaw, right near his ear. "And please don't forget that you're ours first."

"'Ours'?" Evan asks, tiredly, and raises an eyebrow.

At first, Connor doesn't answer, and then he kisses him, again, taking in all he can, as if he'll never get another chance. "Mine."

~

Jared is supposed to be on holiday. That's the wild concept that has become his life. He's a freelance computer guy, and right now, he's on holiday in Argentina.

That's what he's doing. It's that simple. College sucks and always will, and that's something that Jared has slowly come to terms with, even though he was sure he'd succeed at college.

Turns out he was such an unobservant asshole that he didn't realise how much college would suffocate him. He dropped out. His parents weren't happy, but it happened, and now he's attempting to live his best life, sipping a cocktail in a bar, in Argentina.

No thoughts of his old family friend, Evan Hansen, who, last he heard, was being paid a monumental amount of money to fuck around with some fancy science equipment doing fuck knows all, or of the boy who killed himself and left his parents to find his body in the park.

No, Jared has forgotten about his fucked up past, and is looking forward to the future. Travelling. Work. And maybe fun romantic stuff if he tones it down a bit.

He leaves some money on the bar, after finishing his drink, thanks the bartender and walks out onto the street. It's still mildly cold in Buenos Aires, but that doesn't break Jared's stride, doesn't even stutter it.

What _does_ break his stride, is the sight of some guy, down on the corner, with an acoustic guitar and a ponytail. Some guy who looks exactly like Connor Murphy.

And, suddenly, Jared's eighteen years old, again, and sitting in Evan Hansen's bedroom, faking emails to comfort Connor's grieving family. The guy is singing something, and thanking people who put money in his guitar case and Jared is the asshole, standing only a few feet from him, and staring at him like he's seen a ghost.

He practically has.

This cannot be happening. Not to him.

Is he dreaming? Jared pinches his arm and grimaces. Not a dream, then.

Maybe someone spiked his drink. He seriously doubts it.

Maybe he's experiencing some kind of Come To Jesus moment where he atones for his sins by reenacting A Christmas Carol, and this guy with the acoustic guitar, singing in Spanish, is his Ghost of Christmas Past. More serious doubt, there, as Jared is culturally Jewish, and that would really fuck his heritage up if it was a Come To Jesus moment.

In any case, the guy is staring back, now, and Jared is frozen to the spot. Jared can almost picture Connor's photo on top of his coffin at the stuffy funeral, where Jared spent most of his time staring at his shoes and fiddling with the tight collar of his suit. He can almost remember the confusion with which Evan told him that Connor had cut his hair off before he overdosed on sleeping pills in the park. He can feel the regret and the guilt and the fear building up in him, again.

Jared is wondering if maybe Connor faked his death and ran away, all those years ago, when suddenly the guy isn't where Jared is staring, anymore. He's walking towards Jared.

He's walking towards Jared.

Alarms are going off in his head - _ABORT, ABORT, ABORT_ \- but Jared can't manage to make himself move an inch.

"Are you having a stroke?" The guy who looks exactly like Connor Fucking Murphy asks, looking mildly concerned, his acoustic guitar slung over his shoulder.

"Am I having a-? I'm twenty one years old!" Jared splutters out, actually kind of offended. He doesn't look old, he doesn't think, but apparently he looks old enough to be having a stroke in the streets of Buenos Aires.

The Ghost of High School Guilt Past narrows his eyes and nods. "Oh, okay, you're just being a dick." He says, and turns on his heel.

Once again, Jared cannot help but be offended. "Hey!" He calls after the mildly jacked Ghost, taking a few steps towards him.

The Ghost turns to look at him, dead on. "Why were you staring at me?" He asks, and sounds more calm than he looks. Jared slowly goes down the list of his regrets and adds "yelling 'hey' at dead kids doppelgänger in Argentina" to the bottom of it.

"Oh," Jared says, and tries to look anywhere but the Ghost, "it was just a nice song." He totally fails at not looking at the Ghost.

"No one actually likes _Radiohead_." The Ghost tells him, matter-of-factly, and approaches him, once more. "What are you talking about?"

Jared considers turning around, right now, and forgetting this ever happened. He wonders if, next, he'll see a version of Evan Hansen, or Alana Beck. He isn't sure this isn't the result of that time he ate magic mushrooms in college, right before he flunked and everything since then has just been an elaborate guilt and drug induced dream. "You really want to know?" He asks the Ghost of High School Guilt Past.

The Ghost shrugs. "I'm the curious but impatient type." He informs Jared.

"You look exactly like this guy I knew, in high school, who killed himself." Jared tells him, point blank.

The Ghost looks shocked. "Jesus Christ." He mutters.

"Jared Kleinman." Jared replies, and holds out his hand for a handshake.

The Ghost pauses and then smiles a bit, taking Jared's hand in his own, briefly. "Yorick Bateman."

Jared bites his tongue to hold back a snicker. "Sorry, _Yorick_?" He asks, and momentarily remembers that part of English class, in Junior year, where he had to stand up and read a monologue from Hamlet, in front of the class.

"Yep." Yorick agrees, grimacing a bit. "My dads went through a Shakespeare phase."

Jared just decides not to question it. There's plenty of other things to question. "Okay, then."

There is a moment where they both just kinda stand there, staring at each other, as if the other person held the secrets to the universe. Yorick snaps out of his daze, first. "Did you say I looked like a guy who committed suicide?" He asks, sounding uncomfortable.

"Yeah. It was like, three years ago, so I could be fuzzy on the details," Jared says, waving a hand to represent his lack of interest in the event, "but I swear to fuck he had that same brown splotch in his left eye."

"Oh." Yorick seems to consider this, and then starts to walk back to his street corner, Jared follows, just in case he decides to keep talking, which he conveniently does. "That's kinda cool, I guess."

"Are you related to Connor Murphy?" Jared inquires, and wonders if maybe he's being insensitive. He wonders why he cares. He's always been an apathetic asshole, up until now.

"Not that I know of." Yorick replies, and pulls his guitar over his head, putting it back in its coin-scattered case. "Maybe on my mom's side. I don't really know."

"Fuck." He says, and Yorick clicks the case shut. "You're like a fucking clone or something."

"I wouldn't go that far." Yorick says, with another grimace. Jared remembers the scowl that was permanently etched onto Connor's face, how the photo at his funeral didn't look anything like him, because he was smiling. "Don't you think that if human cloning was possible we'd know about it?"

"With this government?" Jared shakes his head. "Fuck no."

Yorick laughs, standing up straight, guitar case in hand, duffle bag over his shoulder. "This is a weird conversation to be having in the middle of a street." He says.

"This is a weird conversation to be having, period." Jared retorts and Yorick laughs again.

"Agreed." He says, and jerks his chin in the direction of the bar Jared walked out of only minutes ago. "Wanna talk more about it over a drink?"

"Sure." He agrees, gesturing for Yorick to lead the way. "Not like I had anything else planned."

~

Yorick Lysander Bateman (yes, that is his real name, Jared is still not and will never be over it) is twenty-one years old. He has two dads, and a surrogate mother who lives in Switzerland. They Skype, every single day. He can speak English, Spanish, Mandarin, and a smidgen of Russian, and failed school so epically that he's now travelling the world and busking in an attempt to "find himself".

Jared has no idea what to make of him. On the one hand, this seems kinda like karma. On the other hand, he doesn't believe in karma. (On an entire other hand - attached to another body because he doesn't have three hands, but has three points - he didn't do anything wrong, and Yorick would be the spitting image of Connor if he didn't wear muscle tops, eyeliner, and tie his hair back in curly ponytails.)

"I can't call you Yorick." Jared says, after his third beer. "It's too obscure."

"You could call me 'Sandy' if you want." Yorick replies, using his fingers to make air quotes. "My mom does, even when my dads complain that she's butchering my name."

"Your dads sound like plebs." Jared mutters, and Sandy seems to hear him.

"They are." Sandy agrees.

Another beer later, Jared asks, "Where do you hail from?"

"If you'd believe it, Ontario." Sandy says.

"Are you _serious_?" Jared is not as shocked as his tone would imply, but Sandy seems to think his interest is the best thing in the history of fucking ever.

"Yep. I know." He nods, and smiles with brilliant straight teeth. "No one believes me."

"You don't have an accent." Jared points out.

"Guess I'm just special." Sandy grins, and then his expression drops and he looks pained. He raises his beer bottle to his forehead and presses it there, not seeming to mind the condensation from the bottle dripping down the bridge of his nose.

"Are you okay?" Jared asks, somewhat hesitantly. Sandy's having a weird affect on him. He isn't usually hesitant.

"Yeah," Sandy waves a dismissive hand, "it's just a headache."

"My mom gets really bad migraines, and she takes these hardcore tablets that knock her out." Jared says, taking a sip from his own beer, and watching Sandy from the corner of his eye. "You got stuff like that?"

"They're not that bad." Sandy says, tone nonplussed and light. He smiles, again, and takes the bottle away from his forehead. "And even if they were, it's a recent thing, so I'm not worried."

"Alright." Jared nods, and hops off his barstool. "I'm gonna step outside for a sec, stay right here."

"Okay." He says, and Jared speed walks from the bar.

Jared leans against the building and scrolls through his list of contacts. Thanks god that he never deleted Evan's number. He doesn't think about it, just presses the call button.

Evan picks up on the fourth ring. "Hello?"

"Evan, oh my god, dude." Jared says, in a rush of breath.

"Jared?" Evan's tone is confused.

"Yeah, man. It's me." He says, laughing, nervously under his breath, hoping this isn't a Ghost of High School Guilt Present event. "Fuck, how long has it been?"

"Two and a half years." Evan says, bluntly, and then, in a more concerned tone, "Are you okay?"

"Physically? I'm in my prime, dude. Mentally?" Jared allows himself a shaky exhale as he leans his head back against the wall, too. "I'm freaking the fuck out."

"Why?" There's the anxious undertone Jared remembers from high school. "What's going on?"

"Well, I flunked out of college and decided to start travelling, because the economy is shit, and soon enough I won't have the money, and currently I'm in Argentina, and, dude, I swear to _fuck_ , I saw Connor Murphy on the street corner, singing a _Radiohead_ song, in Spanish, with an acoustic guitar." He tells him.

There's a long pause, punctuated only by Evan's heavy breathing on the other end of the line. Jared can only imagine that bringing up Connor has set Evan off on some anxiety attack or something. And then, very quietly, Evan says, "Connor Murphy?"

"Yeah, the guy who OD'd on sleeping pills at the park, during senior year? Remember?" Jared was barely involved with the family, and he remembers every detail. There's no possible way that Evan of all people would forget. "You were getting all close with Zoe Murphy because he had your weird sex letter in his pocket and everyone thought it was his suicide note?"

"I remember." Evan snaps. "Sorry. It wasn't actually him, right?"

"I'd fucking hope not, because if it is him, who did the Murphy's bury?" Evan inhales sharply at this statement, so Jared reels it in, a bit more. "I mean, he's the spitting fucking image, dude, but, like, tanned, and kinda jacked. And his hair is way curlier. He looks like if Connor faked his death and went to live in California."

"Fucking hell..." Evan mutters, a bit muffled, as though Evan isn't facing the phone.

"I haven't heard you swear in ages, and I forgot how much I enjoyed it." Jared comments.

"Do you still have Skype?" Evan replies.

"Yeah." He says, and taps his foot on the sidewalk, nodding to passerby to catch his gaze with their own.

"Is the Connor Murphy dopplegänger with you?"

"Yeah, we got drinks."

"Skype me a little later, and have him with you." Evan says, steadily, and Jared hears the faint sound of laptop keys being pushed. "What's his name?"

"Yorick." Jared pauses, for dramatic effect, after saying this. He imagines if he could see Evan's face, he'd look disappointed. "How fucking weird is that?"

"The fellow of infinite jest?" Evan says, almost as though he was remembering something.

"What?" Jared says, because while he wants to go back on topic, he can't help but be confused.

Evan clicks his tongue. "Didn't you pay attention in English?"

"I flunked out of college, Evan." He replies, as deadpan as possible.

"Fine, whatever." It's not a _whatever_ tone, but Jared takes it in stride. "I'll text you when I want to Skype, okay?"

"Okay." Jared agrees. "Bye-" Evan's already hung up. Jared heads back inside.

~

"Are you sure you're not trying to get into my pants?" Sandy asks him, for the third time. They're standing in the elevator in Jared's hotel, waiting to get to the level his hotel room is on, so that Jared can Skype Evan and find out what the fuck is going on. Or at least try to.

"Yeah, Sandy, I'm sure." Jared sighs, before adding, "You're not my type."

"I'm everyone's type." Sandy tells him, leaning heavily on Jared's side.

"I'm just bringing you up here because I'm pretty sure you're a drifter, right about now, and my friend needs to see you for real." He informs him, as gently as possible.

Sandy considers this, for a minute, watching the numbers above the door go steadily up. "This is like _Pretty Woman_." He tells Jared, with a grin.

"No, it's not." He sighs, again.

"Yes, it is. You're taking me to your hotel room because you feel sorry for me. I'm as pretty as Julia Roberts was, in her prime." His grin falls. "I won't suck your dick, you know."

"I'm not asking you to, Sandy." Jared says, tiredly, and the doors open with a chime. He lugs Sandy and all his heavy baggage towards his door, trying to fish his key card out of the back of his jeans pocket.

"I also won't pretend to be your boyfriend for a monumental amount of money...or maybe I will." More silent musing on Sandy's part, Jared thinks as he gets the door open and turns on the lights. "Depends on how monumental the money. I could use that kind of money."

"Okay, sit down." He says, taking Sandy's duffel bag and guitar case, and setting them down by the wardrobe.

Sandy frowns at his surroundings as he sits down on the bed. "This isn't the penthouse."

"This isn't _Pretty Woman_ , either." Jared retorts.

"You lied." Sandy accuses, as Jared goes rummaging through his backpack.

"I did not."

"You did too."

"What about?"

"You said-"

"Here, eat this." Jared says, handing Sandy an oatmeal bar that he bought at the airport, when he arrived. Food always helps him sober up. "I'm pretty sure your dads and your mom would murder me if I let anything bad happen to you."

"Mom certainly would, but I'm not sure about the other two." Sandy says, and flops down the rest of the way, on the bed. There's a long silence as they both eat their oatmeal bars and wait on the Skype call, Jared's computer open, on the bed, in front of them.

"Okay, hold up, Evan's calling." Jared says, suddenly, and clicks the accept button.

"Jared?" Evan says, his picture showing up on screen. He's certainly filled out. Not slouching, who knew he had such broad shoulders?

"I can both hear and see you." Jared says, on instinct. "Can you hear and see me?"

"I can." Evan agrees, and then, he smiles. "Great, I hate it when there's technical difficulties."

"I'm still a wizard at tech stuff, so if something did fuck up, I could probably fix it pretty easily." Jared pauses, inspecting the image of his family friend, on screen. "Is it the lighting or is there a hickey on your neck?"

Evan goes a bit red and slaps a hand to his neck, on the wrong side. "None of your business." He says, shortly. "Show me Yorick."

"Not until you tell me who gave you a hickey." Jared replies, and jerks his chin to the right, or Evan's left. Evan slaps his left hand to his neck, effectively covering up the hickey.

He pauses, running something over in his head. "His name is Ben Childs."

"Noice." Jared says, not sure if there was supposed to be a big production over that. "Alright, here he is in all his glory; Yorick Lysander Bateman."

He tilts his screen so that there's a shot of Sandy, being swallowed by the mountain of oversoft hotel pillows. "Hi." Sandy waves, cheerfully.

"Hello." Evan says to Sandy, not really reacting to the fact that he looks like somebody that they knew in high school, who is now dead. "Is he drunk?"

"Just a bit." Jared admits. "He was talking about _Pretty Woman_ in the elevator."

"Okay," Evan sighs, rubbing his face, "that's super weird."

"But I'm right, right?" He asks, turning the computer back to face himself, again. "He looks exactly like Connor. If Connor made it into his twenties, regularly went to the gym, and to the beach. And used hair product."

"He does." He agrees, tiredly. "It's uncanny."

"Try to sound less enthused, Ev." Jared says, sarcastically, rolling his eyes.

"Sorry, I'm just tired." More drowsy face-rubbing.

"Ben Childs keep you up?" Jared asks, winking.

"Fuck off." Evan groans.

"Jared, have you got some Advil here, man?" Sandy interrupts, sitting up, and grimacing. "My head is pounding like a motherfucker."

"If you ransack my shit in the bathroom, enough, you'll probably find something that'll help out." Jared says, and points to the ensuite.

Evan waits until Sandy is safely ransacking Jared's toiletries, and turns a serious wide-awake gaze on Jared. "Has he been complaining about headaches much?"

"Why?" Jared shoots back.

Evan shrugs and Jared doesn't believe it for a second. "Just interested."

"A little." He admits, shooting his new friend a worried glance. "He's had like three in the last few hours, but he says it's fine, they'll go away eventually."

As soon as Jared says this, Evan goes rigid and his face goes stony. "I need you both to come up to Boston as soon as possible. And then probably Vermont."

"Sorry, what?" Jared demands. "You want me to drop my expensive, college fund paid vacation and come up to you so we can go to ass-fuck Vermont? No one lives in Vermont, Evan. I'm, like, ninety-nine percent sure Vermont isn't a real place."

"How drunk are you, right now?" Evan asks.

"I'm not drunk, you're drunk." He mutters.

Evan looks agitated, like proper, Daisy Buchanan, "um, um," agitated. "Jared, I am being completely serious."

"Do you have any idea how much international flights cost?" Jared demands as Sandy flops down on the bed, again, groaning.

"I'll see what can be done to get you a refund." Evan tells him.

"Evan. This isn't that big of a deal." He tries to reason. "Sandy just looks like your fake dead best friend. It's a coincidence."

"I don't have time to explain to you why it's not just a coincidence." Evan says, somewhat dismissively. "Sandy - Yorick -whatever you want to be called, the people I work with at the DYAD institute have been investigating an illness that begins with constant and painful headaches, and I have reason to believe you might be someone suffering from it."

"Are you kidding me?" Sandy asks, looking a few steps away from devastated. "How serious is this illness?"

"I'm not kidding you." Evan's expression turns sad. "We have reason to believe it is fatal."

"Holy shit." Sandy says.

"I'll come and pick you up from the airport, when you get here." Evan tells them both.

"Thanks." Jared says, numbly.

"Nice to meet you." Sandy concludes, in a similar tone of voice. Evan just nods and disconnects the call.

"Dude," Sandy says, falling into the mountain of pillows. "I'm gonna die."

"No homo," Jared says, snapping his laptop closed, "but not if I can help it."

~

"We have a serious problem." Evan says, closing his laptop. Connor frowns at him, over the back of the couch.

"What is it?" Connor replies, looking concerned.

Evan frowns, rubbing his face with the palms of his hands, tiredly. "Do you remember Jared Kleinman?"

"Fuck," Connor says, wearing an expression that isn't unlike the one people wear when they smell dog poop in their house, "how could I forget?"

"He just found one of your clones in Buenos Aires." Evan informs him.

"Oh fuck." Connor gets to his feet, walking over to Evan, with a kind of urgency that Evan only sees when they're talking clone club business. "Did you tell him?"

"Are you serious? And breach the laws of clone club?" Evan tries for a light, joking tone, feeling too cramped in the panic that's overcome him in the last few weeks. "I'd _never_."

"We've all done it before." Connor informs him, leaning against the stovetop. "Even Lucas."

"Well, I didn't." He says, answering the question. "But I'm bringing them up here, and then maybe sending them to Vermont, because the clone is sick."

"Shit." Connor swears and runs his hands through his hair. "Where's his monitor?"

"No idea. Jared said he's on some soul-search, self-discovery trip."

"Of fucking course."

"Yeah." Evan agrees, sighing.

"What's his name?"

"Yorick Bateman."

"Are you fucking serious?" And Connor is laughing and Evan hasn't heard him laugh in actually ages, so he starts laughing too. It's so stupid. It isn't funny, it's just so obscure, the name and the situation and the fact that they're standing in Evan's kitchenette, in the middle of the night, laughing over something that won't be funny in a few minutes. Evan just misses this. He's been working too hard, too much, to try and fix all of this for Connor and for Reed and Torpedo and Lucas, but it's too much.

Once they've stopped laughing, Evan clears his throat and says, "Jared called him Sandy."

"Are we gonna tell him?" Connor asks, a smile still stretched across his face. "About the clones?"

"Jared or Sandy?" Evan replies.

"Either." Connor says, shrugging, smile getting fractionally smaller. "Both."

Evan leans back, heavily on the stovetop, feeling his fatigue set in. "I think that's you guys' decision." He yawns.

"I gotta call Torpedo." Connor murmurs, kisses Evan's forehead and walks into the bathroom. They're going to work this out, Evan knows they will, but at the moment, it feels like too much.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading, I really hope you liked it. If you did, please let me know a little bit more about that, in the comments, and consider leaving a kudos. Hmu on Tumblr @nose-coffee, and please read the rest of the works in this series; they give me life.
> 
> Again, thank you, I hope you enjoyed.


End file.
